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Some great news, especially those who favor the byzantine manuscripts (as I do!):

I've been working with Dr. Wilbur Pickering to prepare his Greek text for printing as it appears in Family 35 (aka kr), hence my lack of recent posting, and if everything goes as planned, it will hopefully be available as a printed edition on Amazon by the end of this spring! It will also include a full apparatus that compares the text of many published editions as well as the great Uncials. This is truly, an indispensable work (regardless of textual preference) and I'm excited to see it come to print.

In the interim, Dr. Pickering will, very shortly, be publishing his Greek text as seen on his website (letter size format, and without accents) until the current work is completed.

It is but it isn't, lol, the one that is out now is the preliminary printing, that is, essentially the "as is" PDF that is available at http://www.walkinhiscommandments.com/pickering2.htm. It does not have accents and is printed in 8.5 x 11. It is a Perfect bound soft cover book with what looks like 10pt font. The apparatus is very thorough!

I'm still working on proofreading and accenting with Mark, Luke, and John still to go. I'm hoping to be finished with the project by late spring (still have to add the apparatus to the entire NT), at which point the updated copy will have full accents and will be printed in a 6 x 9 book.

CSPMT ( http://www.cspmt.org ) has just recently opened a discussion forum, so if you have any further questions about f35, they would be answered there

As far as your question goes, There are about 1000 variants between RP and f35 http://www.cspmt.org/pdf/collations/RP%20]%20Kr_fam.%2035.pdf. Most noteably the PA which has the M7 profile for F35 (instead of m5) and the Kr text base instead of Kx.

You guys might use this opportunity of printing a New Greek NT to fill one of the needs I feel we have had for a while. I'd like to see:

1. A giant print Greek New Testament. Why not a 24 point font?

2. We need a Byzantine type text printed on opposite pages with an Alexandrian type text. N.A. would probably not allow you to do this, but you could print Pickering's new text opposite Westcott Hort, which is in public domain. The way we are forced to compare the two text types now, in the standard printed versions, namely by looking at lower apparati, is annoying and it is hard to get a full picture of the differences.

3. It would be nice to see Pickering's new text printed on opposite pages to the King James Version or the New King James version. I myself no longer have need of a diglot, but I am just crazy about the KJV.

4. Print the new edition with a soft, fake leather flexible cover and light weight paper like you have in Zondervan's Reader's GNT. I love that book because it feels so good in your hand and you can fold it like a magazine and put it in your back pocket.

How much control do you have over the project? Any chance you could get some of these options produced?

You bring up some very interesting points, some that I would like to see, however, I am only the ‘editor’ and ‘formatter.’ Dr. Pickering is the one who spent years determining the text of F35 (Kr) and has the final say over the project. As of now, he wants his text available with full accentuation and 6 x 9 format. It will be a soft cover book as to keep down the costs of printing, and the page count will determine the size of the font. So far it is 11 pt. It may be adjusted either way once the apparatus is added.

Perhaps some day in the future these ideas could be implemented with permission (I especially like #3 and #4).

UPDATE: The text is essentially completed now. We are now in the the stage of proofreading the entire document, After which, it should be available as the "second edition" on amazon We're expecting completion in the early part of 2015 (somewhere around Jan and Feb)

The text has come out slightly over the 6 x 9 threshold so its slightly bigger, but has been reduced in size from its first edition. The text is now fully accented and is arranged much more nicely. Should you buy it and find any errors, please let me know

"For some time Dr. Pickering has felt that among the many hundreds of Greek manuscripts known to exist today, surely God would have preserved the original wording. … he has concluded that God used a certain line of transmission to preserve that wording.”

I would agree with this statement, however, regardless of your theological standpoint, there is a lot of really good information in this volume. For one the Apparatus is fairly robust, and secondly F35 (Kr) is indeed the most cohesive grouping in the whole MS tradition also being the 2nd biggest grouping. Only Kx is larger, but it is nowehere near as cohesive. Either way, I believe Dr. Pickerings information to be well researched and carefully collated, regardless weather or not you agree with his conclusions.

I like it. If you are going to embrace Protestant Primitivism, which textual criticism is mostly an expression of, it's at least a self-consistent viewpoint. One can't always say that about the rest of the vast employment project.

Of course, someone like Stanley Hauerwas might say that you don't have access to inspired scripture no matter what languages you learn, no matter what manuscripts you dig up, if you aren't reading it under the direction of a religious community. And if reading under that direction, it's hard to imagine God not getting around a few copyist goofs or translation errors or sometimes even a tall tale or two. God might even be able to make Christianity happen among mostly illiterate peoples.

For him to make such communities happen, some would no doubt be given knowledge and talent and languages and manuscripts -- surely a misfortune compared to being given only a simple faith -- and the duty of teaching others, despite their own inadequacies. But I have no special insight to say whether that's how he does it or not.

However, I am interested in hearing more about Family 35 (Kr). What are its general characteristics, unique readings, manuscript history, etc.?

"For some time Dr. Pickering has felt that among the many hundreds of Greek manuscripts known to exist today, surely God would have preserved the original wording. … he has concluded that God used a certain line of transmission to preserve that wording.”

It is truly said that God works in mysterious ways.

It seems to me more likely that God would have gone out of His way to make sure that the original wording was NOT preserved, because He did not want the Gospel to be viewed like the Koran. θησαυρός μέν, ἐν δὲ ὀστρακίνοις σκεύεσι.

Jeidsath wrote:"...if you aren't reading it under the direction of a religious community."

It could be argued that if one had the original wording of the text, that it still wouldn't be fully understood without the aid of the Holy Spirit.

Either way... F35...

Jeidsath wrote:However, I am interested in hearing more about Family 35 (Kr). What are its general characteristics, unique readings, manuscript history, etc.?

Family 35 is an interesting grouping, as I've mentioned earlier it is the second largest grouping of NT manuscripts (latest count puts it around 300). It contains the M7 PA profile (Von soden) and Hoskier's "C" text for the Apocalypse (for the most part). F35 is characterized by non Eusebian Marginalia and has a distinct usage of Aspiration. For example, Abraam in f35 MSS is typically Habraam. It appears that if aspiration occurs mid-word in a foreign transliteration, it was pushed to the beginning so as not to lose the phoneme as the "h" sound can only appear at the start of a Greek word. We begin to see F35 MSS from the XI century up until and after the invention of the press, Dr. Pickering argues that it can be traced further in his book "Identity of the New Testament Text IV". These manuscripts are typically found in various monasteries from the Mt. Athos region. F35 produces somewhere around 5000 variants from NU and about 1500 from RP.

Its most striking characteristic is that each manuscript is textually very close to each other, so much so, that a number of books match perfectly with the f35 archetype. There are perfect representatives from 22 of the 27 books of the NT, information about that is included in the volume.